Monday, February 23, 2009

Monday TV Notes:5PM ET - NASCAR Now on ESPN2: Allen Bestwick hosts with Ray Evernham, Ricky Craven and Randy LaJoie. Program re-airs at 9PM Pacific Time.8PM ET - This Week In NASCAR on SPEED: Aric Almirola is the special guest along with Michael Waltrip and host Steve Byrnes for this program. Show re-airs at 9PM Pacific Time.

Quote of the day:"I shouldn't even have to say it, but I will. A 3:15 p.m. local time start meant that NASCAR absolutely wasted two hours, at least, during which cars could have been racing without rain. At some point we need a final decision on who runs this sport - NASCAR or television." David Poole, Charlotte Observer (click here).

14 comments:

I agree with Poole (We should make T-shirts). This is two weeks in a row we have spend two hours in the Hollywood Hotel instead of racing. If the NFL can have flex-time schedules and move start times up or down depending on weather and what's a stake for the winner (ie, playoff berth, etc.) then NASCAR surely can do it too. Someone needs to do something.

Who should run the sport - anybody other than newspaper reporters, in my opinion.

I'm not entirely clear of all the logistics of moving up the start, but given the attendance problems Fontana has experienced, moving up the start significantly ( and possibly angering ticket holders who had counted on a later start) might not have been possible practically speaking - but reporters don't have to be practical, just semi-grammatical.

This is such a silly question. Who runs NASCAAR? NASCAR runs it. It is their product and they sell this product. They approach a network and get the highest price they can for their product. If Fox says, well, will give you more money if the race starts after 3pm, and NASCAR wants the extra bucks, then it's NASCAR who runs the show. They could take less money, but they don't want to.

Moving the start time after it was set would create a world of problems. Every DVR in the world would miss at least half of the race and irritate a lot of people. My DVR automatically records all races and it would mess it up.

Ken, start times wouldn't have to move up a ridiculous amount to mess up DVR. FOX broadcast time slots are all encompassing, i.e. the pre-race is included. Might miss a few minutes on the other channels, but not too much. When 'hurry-up' mode existed, the races would start at 3 or 33 minutes after the hour (15 minutes earlier than the original green-flag time).

That wouldn't have made much difference last night, but what Poole has to say is SPOT ON.

All this Nascar prerace crap! Is frankly getting Silly! I mean Its going from racers who we'd like to respect..Too a side show where the the drivers play the clowns,Its demeaning to say the least!!(hope I spelled tha right) and Ive said this before and I will say It again! GREED is going to destroy this sport!!You guys in these race cars, have to make some sort of stand for your own self respect..sure!Its a lot of money gang!But to the rest of the racing world It is staring to be somewhat of a joke!!No more boogedy DW..No more gopher cartoons!GOPHER CARTOONS!!! COME ON MAN!!!

@ken--what Anthony said. We don't mean physically moving the TV window up but moving it within the already allotted time. Last week we had what...a 2 1/2 hour pre-race show and this week an hour. So going into "hurry up" mode would have cut the pre-race down and started the race at least 15 minutes earlier within the already allocated TV window.

But last week, they would have had to start about 2 hours (maybe an hour...forget what time the rain actually started) earlier to avoid the rain...which as Richard said would have pissed off folks who arrive to the track late or tune into the coverage a few minutes before the GF is scheduled to wave.

While it's one of those things where you look on one hand to say that they should have looked at the weather and gone up earlier just in case, there are times with traffic that even earlier is still late. When I went to Sears Point, even getting there at 7 am race day it still took forever and a day to get in.

I agree the race times should be earlier I don't agree with changing a start time more than a few minutes after the time has been established. There is the DVR issues but more importantly the fans in the stands. Many go and make a weekend of it and now they are not in the right place when the race starts and if your going for the day I would be livid if they changed the time and there I am sitting in traffic as they throw the green. I appreciated the late start this week because it gave me more time at the hospital with my Mom but in general a standard time of 1pm eastern would be great. I've even seen posts from west coast people that are OK with a very early start.

I simply do not understand the logic of Poole's thinking. Let's say they make next year's race have a start time at 1:00pm. How does he know it will not rain at 2:00? Lately people have been acting like it starts raining at the same time every day in Daytona and Fontana, so since we know what time the rain will start, let's move up the races.

He' is absolutely correct...Don't know much about this Hill character, but it is clear he is more interested in getting non-fan primetime viewers to tune in (helps the ratings) than in providing a quality viewing time for fans. He knows that most of us will watch the end of the race anyway!! Between this issue, and his apparent love of that Rat digger, I don't think he is a friend of the race fan.